


the future is a dying art

by ceserabeau



Category: Teen Wolf (TV), Terminator - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Terminator, F/M, Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-04-11
Updated: 2015-03-20
Packaged: 2018-01-19 00:41:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,329
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1448935
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ceserabeau/pseuds/ceserabeau
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“An order came down from Command,” Scott tells Derek, reaching out to take Allison’s hand. “They want to send someone back to find the person who creates Skynet. They want us to – we have to kill him.” </p><p>Terminator AU where Derek is sent back in time to kill Stiles, the creator of Skynet, but he can’t quite bring himself to pull the trigger</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> So I may have binged on the Sarah Connor Chronicles a little bit to procrastinate from work. Title from Aloe Blacc's _Ticking Bomb_

It’s late when the curtain to Derek’s bunk swings back and Erica’s head appears. Derek recognises the downward curve of her mouth immediately; nothing good ever comes of that look.

“Boss wants to see you,” she says, voice heavy and serious.

“Is something happening?” he asks.

Erica bites her lip like she’s trying to stop herself for blurting something out, but in the end she says, “Go talk to Scott,” and vanishes in a flash of blonde hair.

When he gets to the command room there’s a crowd of people around the table, Scott and Allison at their centre. There’s a load of charts spread out across the table, graphs with Lydia careful writing all over them, with Scott and Allison are hunched over them, talking in low voices.

He pauses in the doorway and Scott glances up at him. He looks exhausted, the circles under his eyes deep and dark. From where Derek’s standing it looks like something is weighing him down, crushing him. It makes Derek’s heart flutter with panic: he’s never seen Scott like this, and the sense of foreboding he feels increases tenfold.

“Derek,” Allison says, turning to face him, “Glad you could come.”

Everything about her tone says she’s not glad at all, and from the dark looks on the faces of every other person in the room whatever’s about to happen is not going to be good.

“Erica said you wanted to see me?” he calls.

Allison and Scott share a glance, before Scott gestures for Derek to come in. “There’s some things we need to discuss,” he says,

“Do we have a target for a raid?” Derek asks, because it’s only things like excursions into the dead zone or raids on Skynet headquarters that make people look like that.

“Not quite,” Allison says.

“An order came down from Command,” Scott tells him, reaching out to take Allison’s hand. “They want to send someone back to find the person who creates Skynet. They want us to – we have to kill him.”

Derek feels like he’s been sucker-punched. “What?” he stutters out, and both Scott and Allison avert their eyes.

They obviously know how ridiculous it is – no, how insane it is. Command has sent them many crazy orders in the past, but this is a whole new level. Derek knows they’re losing the war, has seen it in the number of soldiers who make it back from missions, but if Command is ordering something this dangerous then they must be getting desperate.

“Why me?” Derek asks when he can find his voice again.

“I trust you to get the job done,” Scott says, but Derek knows it’s more than that.

“I’m the only person you can send,” he says, and when Scott flinches he knows he’s right.

Derek is the only person on the base who doesn’t have any attachments. He lost most of his family in a Skynet attack, and Laura not long after. Even Cora is gone, shipped off to some other Resistance base; the two of them can’t focus when they’re together, too concerned about the other to be able to fight, so she had to go too. Everyone has someone – Scott and Allison; Isaac and Boyd and Erica and their three-way thing; Ethan and Danny, Lydia and Jackson – everyone except him.

It still makes him want to shout at them, because it’s unfair that he should be the one to give everything up.

“What are the mission parameters?” Derek asks instead. If nothing else he’s a good soldier, the best, and he can be a professional when it counts.

The look Scott gives him is grateful. “You’re being sent back to 2013. The man you’re looking for is called Stanislaw Stilinski, goes to Cal Tech University.”

Derek raises an eyebrow at the name; clearly not an American, must be some foreign scientist. Who the hell is this person he’s going after?

“This is the address,” Allison says, handing him a piece of paper with what Derek assumes is a street name. “It’s in Pasadena.”

Derek flinches involuntarily “That’s Skynet territory,” he says quietly.

“It’s okay,” Scott says, even though the look on his face says otherwise; “Lydia’s set the equipment to drop you as close as possible to the address.”

“You have twenty-four hours to do it and return to the extraction point,” Allison says. “Lydia’s working on setting up a return pulse so we can get you back here safe and sound.”

“And if I don’t make it in time?” Derek asks.

No one says anything, but they don’t have to. Derek knows what will happen if he doesn’t make it to the drop point: he’ll be stuck there, trapped in that time forever. He’ll never come back; he’ll never see his friends or family again. It’s a risk he’s willing to take.

Allison puts a gentle hand on his arm, pulling him out of his thoughts. “Do you think you can do it?” she asks.

“I’ve killed before,” Derek says with a nod, because he has, many times and in many different ways.

But Allison just frowns at him. “Those were machines, Derek. This is different. This is a person, a human being.”

“I can do it,” he says and knows in his gut that it’s true.

No matter how wrong it might be, he has to. For the sake of his family, his friends, for the entire human race, he has to do it. If it means blood on his hands, then so be it.

Allison must see something on his face because she nods and hands him a file before she dismisses him. It’s not thick; he flicks through it quickly on his way back to his bunk. There’s very little to go on, just a name and a list of information that Derek assumes are qualifications of some kind.

By the time he’s reached his bunk, Derek knows everything there is to know about Stanislaw Stilinski. He is, by all accounts, a math genius, if Lydia’s tiny scrawl is anything to go by. His list of achievements and patents are long, but there’s only one circled in red. That’s it, the thing that Skynet grows from and seeing it there on the page only strengthens his resolve.

When he reaches his bunk, Erica’s sitting on his bed, waiting. She looks up when he pulls back the curtain and her face is even more serious than before.

“Did you know?” he asks, and the way she avoids his eyes says it all.

“I wasn’t allowed to tell you,” she says softly. “I told them it’s crazy, sending you back to kill someone. I mean, you’re not a machine, Derek, you’re not a _murderer_.”

“I have to do it,” he tells her, but Erica shakes her head violently.

“You don’t! There’s no guarantee you’re even coming back and I can’t – we can’t lose you.” She takes a deep breath and Derek can see her hands are shaking. “I know losing Laura was hard for you, but it’s no reason for you to accept a suicide mission –”

Derek cuts her off sharply. “I’ve made my choice,” he says softly. Erica looks like she’s going to interrupt, but Derek knows that if he doesn’t stop her she’ll be able to talk him out of it so he barrels on. “I’m doing this – for you, for Boyd and Isaac, for everyone. I need you to support me with this.”

“I don’t think I can,” Erica says.

It feels like a punch to the gut. “Then maybe you should go,” Derek whispers and Erica’s eyes glisten with tears.

“If that’s what you want,” she says and disappears with a flick of the curtain.

Derek watches her go, reigning in the urge to reach out to her, and once she’s disappeared he sinks slowly down into the space she’s left. The blanket is still warm under his hands, the heat of her body lingering, and Derek curls up on the mattress, inhaling Erica’s scent where it clings to his pillow.

All he wants to do is go to where he knows she and Boyd and Isaac will be, let them sooth his frazzled nerves and shaking hands. But he can’t – if he sees them he knows that he’ll break, that he’ll find a reason to stay.

Derek closes his eyes and waits for dawn.


	2. Chapter 2

The LA Derek knows is a wasteland seen through binoculars, decorated with bombed out buildings and the shells of factories. A land of death and dust and decay, of gleaming metal and glowing red eyes.

But this LA, twenty five years in the past, is nothing like that. It’s hot, burning hot, and brighter than anything Derek’s already seen. There are people on every corner, hundreds of them pushing and pulling at him. Thousands of cars roaring past on the street. All the things that he has never known.

It’s not the first time someone’s been sent back. Scott helped set up a group of Resistance fighters in this time, or at least close to it, so there should be a cache of weapons waiting for him in a pre-designated place.

The address Allison gave him isn’t hard to find once Derek asks for directions. It’s an old apartment building, fairly run down, but Derek lives in a bunker; he hardly has room to talk. Security is lax: the main door opens with a push and there are no security cameras watching as Derek climbs the stairs to the fourth floor.

5F is the last door on the right, on the corner of the building. The long walk down the corridor seems to take years; it feels like every time he heads into the field: terrifying, overwhelming, suicidal.

But Derek is a good soldier; there’s a reason he leads the forward assault team. He can shoot a gun, wield a knife, knows when to take the shot, where to aim. He can do what has to be done. So he steels himself, raises his hand and knocks.

The door swings open and Derek’s breath catches for a second when he gets a good look at the guy standing in front of him. Messy brown hair, huge eyes, freckles splattering his skin like the constellations he and Erica stare at in the night sky. Something about him makes Derek’s insides go liquid, before he steels himself and plasters a smile on his face.

“Hi,” he says, watching the guy carefully, “I’m looking for Stanislaw Stilinski?”

The guy’s face goes from interested to suspicious in seconds, and he looks Derek up and down slowly. “Are you are?”

“Uh,” and Derek really isn’t prepared to be getting chatty with strangers, “I’m Derek.”

The guy raises an eyebrow. “You don’t sound so sure,” he says, and Derek frowns at him.

“Do you know where I can find Stilinski or not?” he demands, and the guy rears back a little.

“Jeez, chill out,” he says. “I’m Stilinski, who the hell are you?”

Derek freezes. There’s no way this guy, this weird young kid, is Stilinski, the guy who destroys the world. And if he is – well, this is going to be worse than Derek thought.

“Are you sure?” he asks. “Stanislaw Stilinski? Maths genius? Good with computers?”

The guy rolls his eyes. “Yeah I’m sure, asshole. Now you obviously know me, but I don’t know you so – hey!”  

Derek pushes him back into the apartment and follows, making sure to shut the door so that the guy – _Stilinski_ – can’t get out that way.

“What the hell are you doing?” he shouts, tripping over his feet as he tries to regain his balance.

“Shut up,” Derek says and pulls out his gun.

Stilinski freezes, eyes going wide. “I don’t have anything worth stealing,” he says slowly and Derek wants to laugh at how that is his biggest fear, being stolen from. “Really, the only computer I have here is my laptop and that’s close to breaking – I do all my work in the lab so –”

Derek shoves the gun in his face. “I said shut up,” he growls, because Stilinski’s babbling is really not helping with what he has to do here.

“I can’t,” Stilinski mutters; “I talk when I’m nervous and that gun is making me really, _really_ nervous.”

“I’m not here to steal from you,” Derek says, and immediately wonders why he’s bothering explaining himself. He should just shoot the guy and go.

“Then what to do you want?” Stilinski asks quietly.

“I’m here to kill you,” Derek says, and flexes his finger on the trigger.  

Stilinski’s eyes go even wider and he stumbles back a few steps into what must be the living room. “Why do you want to do that?” he asks, voice shaking a little.

Derek shakes his head. “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”

Stilinski barks out a laugh. “You just told me you’re going to murder me. I’d at least like to know why.”

Derek sighs. He surveys the apartment for a moment and, happy that the only way out is the front door, motions for Stilinski to sit down. He lowers his gun a little, but still looms over him to make sure Stilinski doesn’t go anywhere.

“In a few years the US government will create a network to help with national defence, an artificial intelligence called Skynet. Five years from now, in 2019, Skynet becomes self-aware. It sees mankind as a threat and triggers a nuclear apocalypse. You build it, the machine that destroys the world,” and Derek takes a shaking breath, “So I have to kill you before you can do it.”

When he looks up, Stilinski’s staring at him like he’s grown a second head. “You’re crazy,” he breathes.

Derek lets out a laugh that’s more wry than amused. “Not even a little,” he says and chuckles again at the sceptical look on Stilinski’s face.

“This is like a bad movie,” Stilinski mutters, and he scrubs at his eyes. “Wait, if you’re from the future how did you get here?”

“Time displacement device,” Derek tells him and Stilinski looks shocked at his matter-of-fact tone.

“You’re serious, aren’t you?” he asks. “You believe that this happens?”

“I _know_ it happens,” Derek says. “I was born in 2018 – I witnessed Judgement Day. I grew up in a bunker, so far underground the machines can’t detect us. We live every day in fear of being detected, of being wiped off the map entirely.”

“You’re talking about it like it’s the end of the world.”

Derek blinks at him. “Because it was. The human race has been hunted to extinction. Most died in the bombing, but Skynet hunts down any humans it can find.”

Stilinski laughs, a dry sound. “You realise this all sounds ridiculous,” he says.  

“You see this,” and Derek lowers the gun completely to pull back his sleeve, revealing the barcode burned into the skin of his arm, “This is from a Skynet work camp where they kill thousands of people a day.”

Stilinski reaches out with a trembling hand and brushes gentle fingers along where Derek’s skin is red and raw. Both of them flinch back at the contact.

“It’s real,” Stilinski whispers, not taking his eyes from Derek’s arm.

“Still ridiculous?” Derek asks, pulling his sleeve back down as if that will stop the unease he feels at someone touching his scar.

Stilinski drops his head into his hands, takes several deep breaths. His whole body is tense, so Derek keeps the gun ready, just in case. But eventually Stilinski just lifts his head and stares at Derek with those big, dark eyes.

“How many people die?” he asks, voice quiet in the still of the room.

“Five billion,” Derek says, and the colour drains from Stilinski’s face.

“That many?” Derek can only nod. “Are you sure it’s me? Because I’m an engineer, I don’t do programming. I couldn’t build an AI to save my life.”

Derek nods again. “You build it. You’re the one who designs it.”

“I don’t know how to do that though,” Stilinski says, throwing his hands up. “Unless I - oh god.”

“What?”

“I built a CPU a couple of months ago, a hypercube.” At Derek’s confused look, Stilinski explains. “The shape improves communication. It could end the need for binary coding. Billions and billions of computations per second – that’s the sort of thing that can be developed for an AI.”

Derek shakes his head slowly. “No, it’s something you build in the future.”

“What if it’s not?” Stilinski asks; “What if that’s it?”

“According to the intel you don’t build it until February 3rd 2014.”

Stilinski’s head shoots up suddenly and his eyes are bright with something that might be fear. “It’s August,” he says.

The words don’t really register. “What do you mean?” Derek asks.

“It’s August,” Stilinski repeats. “I already built it.”

Derek’s stomach drops. “No – _no_. It’s 2013.”

Stilinski shakes his head and Derek feels like he’s going to puke. He’s too late. Right place, just the wrong time. He’ll have to go back again, get Lydia to send him through earlier, early enough that he can stop it, that he can stop Stilinski from building this hypercube.

“Shit, shit,” he whispers, and the gun falls from his lax grip with a clatter. He tries to grab it, but his legs give way and he crashes to the floor. He lies there, unable to move, his mind racing and his heart pounding and it feels like he can’t breathe. His lungs feel like they’re burning, like they’re on fire, and darkness is closing in on him.

Gentle hands touch his face, someone cradling like his mother used to do in the dark of the bunker, and a body curves itself around his back. “Breathe,” a voice says, and Derek clings to it, focuses on the sound and lets it draw him up out of the black.

“Just breathe with me,” the voice says and he follows the slow inhale-exhale of the chest moving against his back, steady and regular, until he feels less like his body is rebelling against him. He opens his eyes cautiously and finds that Stilinski’s holding him tight, body curved around his. When he sits up, they’re almost face-to-face, pressed together like they are.

“Thank you,” Derek says softly and Stilinski smiles softly. This close Derek can see the way his eyes crinkle at the corners.

“Not a problem,” he says. “I used to get panic attacks all the time when I was little.”

It’s been a long time since anyone touched him, and even then it wasn’t particularly tenderly. Derek forces himself to shuffle backwards to put some space between them before he does something stupid like kiss Stilinski.

Stilinski’s open expression shutters, his eyes going cold, and his body tenses suddenly. Derek forces himself to stand slowly, wary of the way Stilinski’s eyes are focussed on the gun where it lies on the floor.

“Don’t,” Derek says; low, a warning.

Stilinski’s eyes flick from the gun to him and back again. “Are you still going to kill me?” he asks quietly.

Derek shakes his head. “There’s no point.”

“But you’re going to go, aren’t you?” Stilinski asks. “Kill me somewhere further back down the line?”

Derek can’t meet his eyes, because that’s exactly what he’s going to do.

“What if we destroyed it?” Stilinski says then. “The hypercube? Would that be enough?”

“No,” Derek says. He feels suddenly exhausted, the thought of having to kill Stilinski suddenly weighing him down. “The technology’s already in the right place. It’s already too late.”

Stilinski sighs, throws his hands up. “Look, I can’t undo it – I can’t destroy it. But I can help you.”

“What do you mean?” Derek asks with a frown.

“You’re going back to your time, right?” Derek nods at him. “So take me with you.”

Derek’s mind stutters to a halt. “Why would I do that?”

“Well, I helped build it,” Stilinski says and grins, sharp and bright. Derek’s heart flipflops in his chest a little. “I can help you take it apart.”


	3. Chapter 3

The world is greyer than Derek remembers, in his own time. In the cold basement of the base, Stilinski - _Stiles_ shivers and Derek fights the urge to wrap him in his arms.

Instead he pushes himself upright, reaching out blindly for the blanket Erica thrusts at him. Somewhere nearby someone is shouting, but Derek’s whole body is starting to shake uncontrollably so he just wraps the blanket around himself and hunkers down inside it.

“Are you okay?” Erica asks, voice low in his ear.

Derek frowns at the floor: “Do I look okay?”

His vision is blurry, shaky, like his brain is rattling around his skull. A side effect of the jump, he knows, but it doesn’t make him feel any better. A pair of boots come into his eye line and when Derek looks up Lydia is looming over him.

“Lydia,” he manages to croak out, trying to scramble to his feet.

She places a steadying hand on his arm. “Easy,” she says, “Just sit down for a moment. You’re going to feel nauseous, dizzy. It’ll pass, but just stay there.” She glances over her shoulder at where Stiles is hunched over, face pale and frightened. “So I guess it didn’t go so well then.”

Behind her, someone clears their throat: Scott, standing in the doorway, Allison close behind. He takes one look around the room and a frown crosses his face, confusion clouding his eyes.

“What’s going on?” he demands. “I was told Derek was back. Who the hell is this?”

Derek opens his mouth, but he has no words, only a sudden sinking feeling that he might have fucked everything up by bringing Stiles here.

“I’m Stiles,” Stiles says into the silence, and every head turn to towards him. “Um, hi, uh, Derek brought me back to help.”

Something must click because Allison spins suddenly towards Derek. “You were meant to kill him,” she shouts and across the room, Stiles flinches.

Derek forces himself to stand, even if he has to lean heavily on Erica to do it. “You sent me back too late,” he says to Allison. “He says he can help destroy Skynet. I thought it was better to get him here to try than just kill him for the sake of it.”

Allison looks like she wants to say something else, but Scott puts a gentle hand on her shoulder. “Erica,” he says in a voice that is deadly calm, “Could you please escort Derek to medical.”

It’s not a question; it’s an order. Erica grasps Derek’s arm firmly and pulls, and he lets himself be led to the door. He tries to ignore the way Stiles’ gaze is burning into him, but he can’t help glancing over to check on him, just for a second.

Stiles looks as bad as Derek feels. He’s pale and shaking, eyes wide and frightened as he watches Derek walking towards the door. Lydia is looming over him, one hand on his shoulder and the other on her gun. In between them are Scott and Allison, Boyd, Isaac and the rest, all watching with accusing eyes.

Erica squeezes his arm, and Derek turns away. He follows where she leads: out the basement, down the corridor, left, right, left again, until they reach the medical wing where she pushes him unceremoniously down onto a cot.

“Stay here,” she orders, and vanishes.

Derek sits and waits, staring blankly at the wall, unseeing. His mind is back in the room with Stiles, with Scott and Allison and Lydia, with the threat of the death still looming large. He stares at the grey paint and tries not to think about what might happen to Stiles without him there to protect him.

Footsteps echo in the room, a voice asking, “Derek?” When he turns it’s Erica, with the doctor, Deaton, close behind.

“How are you feeling?” Deaton asks, pulling some instruments out of drawers: a stethoscope, a syringe, as Erica perches on the cot beside him.

“How do you think I’m feeling?” Derek snaps.

Next to him, Erica sighs and nudges Derek hard in the side. “ _Behave_ ,” she tells him, before turning to Deaton. “He’s feeling like shit.”

Deaton nods. “I’m not surprised,” he says. “You’ve done two time jumps in less than twenty-four hours. And there were two of you coming back.”

Derek tries not to flinch at the mention of Stiles but it’s hard, almost impossible. Just the thought of him, somewhere in this bunker, being interrogated or worse, sets Derek on edge. Next to him Erica twitches, uncomfortable.

“You couldn’t do it,” she says quietly.

She doesn’t say _you couldn’t kill him_ , but Derek knows exactly what she means.

“No shit,” Derek mutters. He holds as still as possible as Deaton carefully checks him over. “I’m not in the business of killing innocent people.”

Erica snorts. “I thought it was something you _had to do_.”

Derek glares at her, but the anger is aimed more at himself than at her. This is his mistake. He’s screwed up his mission: he had one task to do and he let himself be distracted by soft lips and a pair of big brown eyes.

Erica must see it on his face because she puts a hand on his arm. “We’ll fix this,” she says. “We’ll just go back further – kill him properly.”

“ _No_.” Derek jerks out of her hold, even as Deaton protests his movement. “He can help us here.”

Erica’s eyes narrow. “Can he?”

Derek can see what she’s thinking, written plainly in the furrow of her brow, the angry set of her mouth. This is a future that Stiles created. Whether he knows it or not, he has the blood of millions of people, of their friends and families, on his hands. He already has a target painted on his back.

If the machines don’t kill him, then the survivors will.

**Author's Note:**

> All I seem to write is AUs, I'ma work on that.


End file.
